The tale of a 104-y-o COVID-19 survivor
Published:Sunday | August 22, 2021 | 12:06 AMJanet Silvera - Senior Gleaner Writer
WESTERN BUREAU:
Surviving two major health events – critical surgery and COVID-19, which is killing younger patients – 104-year-old Isola Mamby’s family and doctors credit early home care as the main reason why she is still in good health.
Mamby, a retired nurse trained at the Kingston Public Hospital, and who served in the New York health system, contracted the coronavirus in March while admitted at a major hospital in Kingston, after breaking her hip and had to have it surgically corrected.
“When she was discharged about a week after the surgical procedure, I realised that she seemed to have contracted a respiratory infection, which turned out to be COVID, so I panicked because I said at her age with a pre-existing condition, and no vaccines at the time, she was not going to make it,” the centenarian’s daughter, Dr Jennifer Mamby-Alexander, told The Sunday Gleaner.
Mamby-Alexander said she was also not about to give up on her mom, so she reached out to her colleagues and received remote help from them. One of the individuals who responded not just virtually, but physically, was consultant neurosurgeon Dr Roger Hunter, who also caught the virus in the process.
The elderly woman had a high temperature, a terrible cough and pneumonia, and because of exposure, her daughter Dr Mamby-Alexander also became ill.
“I became physically drained. In her condition she was trying to fight the disease and that was very difficult for me as well. I am sure early intervention was what saved her,” Alexander shared.
Isola Mamby was placed on a full course of Ivermectin, which at the time was hard to source; steroids, antibiotics, oxygen, blood thinners, physiotherapy and two hours in the sun daily. However, while being cared for at home, her daughter collapsed under COVID complications.
“I collapsed looking after her, so she had to return to the hospital for two weeks, while I stayed home and recovered by using Ivermectin and the sun every two hours every single day, because viruses like cold temperature,” stated Dr Mamby-Alexander.
Dr Hunter who treated Mamby and her daughter also contracted the virus, and swears that like the importance of early diagnoses of diseases, early home care was what kept all three of them alive.
Included in the 104-year-old retired nurse’s diet were vitamins C and D and magnesium, and today, both doctors say they know she would have died from pneumonia if they had not jumped into action immediately.
“We are being told ‘stay a you yard, stay home’, but that I don’t think that is the best thing at this time. I think we are at a point where we can start simple inflammatory medicine,” noted Dr Mamby-Alexander.
Because viruses thrive in cold temperature, and they get into air conditioning systems easily and can be redistributed again in central air conditioning, COVID-19 patients are better off in well-ventilated areas, and not necessarily in four degrees ICUs, Dr Mamby-Alexander added.
She noted that it is difficult to treat a viral infection under those conditions.
Alive to tell the stories of her mom and herself, the surgical pathologist was grateful to her colleagues who rallied around her, with Dr Garth Rattray donating an oxygen concentration as part of their home care.
A lot of people have been known to die alone with COVID, but Dr Hunter said he was not about to allow this to happen to his colleague or her mother. “He (Hunter) said we are going give her as much care as possible until we can do no more,” Mamby-Alexander said.
SYMPTOMS TO WATCH
Mamby is among some 150 people helped by Dr Hunter free of charge. The consultant neurosurgeon and spinal surgeon considers this his duty during a crisis. He said those he has treated for COVID-19 have recovered fully without requiring hospitalisation.
The symptoms Dr Hunter says persons should look out for are runny nose; fever; dry, persistent, non-productive cough, which at times can cause severe chest pain; headache, loss of smell and taste; weakness and tiredness; and abdominal pain and muscle cramps.
“Once you start experiencing these symptoms, contact your independent public health provider, because the Government to this day has refused to engage and provide Jamaica with a protocol on how to treat people early,” Dr Hunter told The Sunday Gleaner.
At 3:00 a.m. on Saturday, he said he was receiving calls from a government hospital asking for help with the protocol of the treatment algorithm, because they were forced to send the patients home, owing to no beds caused by overwhelming cases of COVID-19.
Dr Hunter would not reveal the name of the hospital.
“The Government has not given the hospitals any protocols on how to treat COVID patients at home. Because the hospitals are so full now, they have no choice but to send patients back home,” he said.
Dr Hunter, who is willing to share the home care protocol with any Jamaican suffering from the virus, stressed that intervention must occur within five days of contracting the disease.
Menthol steaming and oral hygiene, Dr Hunter said, were also critical along with vitamins to help prevent death.
Dr Hunter has been a divisive figure and voice in the medical community, particularly because of his unorthodox ideology about treating the coronavirus disease.
Among those who have pushed back at his lobby have been high-profile doctors like Michael Abrahams, Garth Rattray, epidemiologist Peter Figueroa, and Andrew Manning, president of the Medical Association of Jamaica.
Dr Hunter’s advocacy that lots of sunshine is a palliative for treating COVID-19 has been criticised as simplistic by noted colleagues in the medical community, as has his insistence that the infection primarily thrives in cold countries - a narrative contradicted by the virus’ prevalence and fatality in warm climates in the Americas.
Even with the bed space crisis in public hospitals, the affirmation of early home care is likely to draw reservation from health ministry officials, who have cited late reporting of adverse symptoms as a factor why medical intervention is often sought beyond the point of return.
“This is a national response, and this is how I am treating patients. It is a national emergency,” Dr Hunter insisted.
When The Sunday Gleaner spoke with the 104-year-old Mamby on Saturday, she said all she wanted now was to get up and walk. She has not yet recovered from her hip surgery.